N02384:1309
A complete body of divinity in two hundred and fifty expository lectures on the…A compleat body of divinity in two hundred and fifty expository lectures on the…
A complete body of divinity in two hundred and fifty expository lectures on the Assembly's Shorter catechism wherein the doctrines of the Christian religion are unfolded, their truth confirmed, their excellence displayed, their usefulness improved; contrary errors & vices refuted & exposed, objections answered, controversies settled, cases of conscience resolved; and a great light thereby reflected on the present age. / By the Reverend & learned Samuel Willard, M.A. late Pastor of the South Church in Boston, and vice-president of Harvard College in Cambridge, in New-England. ; Prefaced by the pastors of the same church. ; [Six lines of Scripture texts]A compleat body of divinity in two hundred and fifty expository lectures on the Assembly's Shorter catechism wherein the doctrines of the Christian religion are unfolded, their truth confirm'd, their excellence display'd, their usefulness improv'd; contrary errors & vices refuted & expos'd, objections answer'd, controversies settled, cases of conscience resolv'd; and a great light thereby reflected on the present age. / By the Reverend & learned Samuel Willard, M.A. late Pastor of the South Church in Boston, and vice-president of Harvard College in Cambridge, in New-England. ; Prefac'd by the pastors of the same church. ; [Six lines of Scripture texts]
printed by B. Green and S. Kneeland for B. Eliot and D. Henchman, 1726
AN EXPOSITION OF THE ASSEMBLY's SHORTER CATECHISM: IN Two Hundred a… › Sermon 48 (Question 12)
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
3. THE Rule of special Government is the Moral Law. This may at first seem doubt full; but to make it out, let these things be observed, (1.) WHERE there is Government there must be a Rule. This belongs to the very Nature of it: To Rule a Subject without a Rule to direct, is Tyranny, and not Government among Man; and tho' God's Will be His Rule, yet God hath in Himself an Idea of that which He will manage the Creatures by, and it is wise and just. Government is for an End, and therefore it must have it's Rule, how else should it reach it's End? (2.) THIS Rule is properly called a Law. And the Reason is, because it refers to Government; and it bears the Denomination of a Law in two respects, 1. IN respect to Him that Governs. It is the Ground upon which he proceeds in this Administration, and to which he refers himself in it: He makes it his own Law, to which he restrains himself; and it is the Rule of his Justice in all his proceedings: We read, Gen. 38 21. Discern, I pray thee, whose are these. And there must be a Law to discern between right and wrong in a Judge. God therefore obligeth Himself to this. 2. IN respect to the Subjects, or them that are Governed. It sets them their bounds, which if they come short of, or go beyond, they become guilty of Transgression. Hence, Sin hath that Description, 1 Joh. 3.4. —Sin is the transgression of the Law. He being under the Authority of the Rule, it becomes a Law to him, and he cannot decline from it without Sin▪ because he is obliged to conform himself entirely to it. ⟨p. 150⟩(3.) THE Excellency […] a Law, […] appears, in its being suited to the Nature and […] of the […]. The design of a Law being to Govern the Subject suitably to its End and that respecting it's Actions; it must needs have respect to its Nature; for the Operation is according to the Being of the thing: and therefore Creatures of different Kinds or Natures, must have differing Laws. That cannot be a Law to one, that may be to another. Law is founded in the highest Reason; but to require the same of an Unreasonable Creature, that may be of one that is Reasonable, is a thing unreasonable▪ See, Joh 35.10, 11. (4.) HENCE, Man being a Moral Agent, it was s;et that be should have a Moral Law to Govern him y. Without this, his Moral […], which are only truly and properly Humane, would be under to Government;